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Akan
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Akan tribal chief. Akan memorial head
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Akan tribal chief.
Akan tribal chief.

Akan

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Akan, ethnolinguistic grouping of peoples of the Guinea Coast who speak Akan languages (of the Kwa branch of the Niger-Congo family). They include the speakers of the Akyem, Anyi, Asante (Ashanti), Attié, Baule, Brong, Chakosi, Fante (Fanti), and Guang languages; some scholars also consider Twi a distinct Akan language. Most Akan peoples live in Ghana, where they settled in successive waves of migration between the 11th and 18th centuries; others inhabit the eastern part of Côte d’Ivoire and parts of Togo.

Yams are the staple food crop in the Akan economy, but plantains and taro also are important; cocoa and palm oil are major commercial resources.

Akan memorial head
Akan memorial headMemorial head, Akan culture, Ghana, 17th–mid-18th century; in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City.

Traditional Akan society is composed of exogamous matrilineal clans, the members of which trace their descent from a common female ancestor; these clans are hierarchically organized and are subdivided into localized matrilineages, which form the basic social and political units of Akan society. Most Akan live in compact villages that are divided into wards occupied by the matrilineages and subdivided into compounds of extended multigeneration families. The village is a political unit under a headman, elected from one of the lineages, and a council of elders, each of whom is the elected head of a constituent lineage. The lineage head is the custodian of the lineage’s stools, which are the symbols of unity between the spirits of the ancestors and the living members of the lineage; every lineage also has its own god or gods. There is a strong feeling of corporate responsibility among lineage members. Matrilineal descent also governs inheritance, succession, and land tenure. Paternal descent is also recognized and determines membership in the ntoro, a group sharing certain taboos, surnames, forms of etiquette, and ritual purification ceremonies.

The most prominent aspect of Akan religion is an ancestor cult the rites of which serve to enforce tribal unity and morality. Other religious practices are based on belief in a supreme deity who created the universe and in lesser deities and spirits. Many Akan are now Christians.

This article was most recently revised and updated by Virginia Gorlinski.